The deluge of NVIDIA leaks continue following the major cyber-attack on the company, with hackers getting away with sensitive information about current and upcoming products. The latest in this series covers the memory bus widths of the next-generation RTX 40-series GPUs based on the "Ada Lovelace" graphics architecture. There is early-information covering the streaming multiprocessor (SM) counts of each GPU, and their large on-die caches.

The top-of-the-line AD102 silicon allegedly has a 384-bit wide memory bus, similar to its predecessor. The next-best AD103 silicon has a 256-bit wide memory bus. Things get very interesting with the AD104, which has a 192-bit wide memory bus. The AD104 is a revelation here, because it succeeds a long line of NVIDIA GPUs with 256-bit memory buses (eg: GA104, TU104, GP104, GM204, etc). This confirms the theory that much like AMD, NVIDIA is narrowing the memory bus widths in the lower segments to cut board costs, and compensate for the narrower bus-width with large on-die caches, high memory data-rates, and other memory-management optimizations.

ASUS joined the GeForce RTX 2060 12 GB party with a pair of graphics card models under its DUAL series. NVIDIA earlier this month launched the RTX 2060 12 GB, a new SKU based on the "Turing" graphics architecture. This is more than a doubling in memory amount over the original RTX 2060. The new SKU features 2,176 CUDA cores, as compared to 1,920 on the original. NVIDIA is looking to target the Radeon RX 6600 with it.

The ASUS RTX 2060 EVO DUAL and DUAL OC graphics cards feature the company's latest iteration of the DUAL cooling solution, which features an aluminium fin-stack heatsink with heat-pipes tha make direct contact with the "TU106" GPU at the base; while a pair of the company's latest-generation Axial-Tech fans ventilate it. The DUAL OC SKU runs the GPU at 1680 MHz boost, while the DUAL sticks to NVIDIA-reference clock speeds of 1650 MHz boost. A software-based OC mode unlocks higher clocks on both SKUs. For the DUAL OC, this means 1710 MHz, and for the DUAL (standard) it means 1680 MHz. Both cards rely on a single 8-pin PCIe power connector. Display outputs include one DisplayPort 1.4, two HDMI 2.0, and one dual-link DVI-D. The cards are expected to be priced around 550€.

NVIDIA's surprise launch of the GeForce RTX 2060 12 GB graphics card could stir things up in the 1080p mainstream graphics segment. Apparently, there's more to this card than just a doubling in memory amount. Specifications put out by NVIDIA point to the card featuring 2,176 CUDA cores, compared to 1,920 on the original RTX 2060 (6 GB). 2,176 is the same number of CUDA cores that the RTX 2060 SUPER was endowed with. What sets the two cards apart is the memory configuration.

While the RTX 2060 maxed out the "TU106" silicon, the RTX 2060 12 GB is likely based on the larger "TU104," in order to achieve its CUDA core count. The RTX 2060 SUPER features 8 GB of memory across a 256-bit wide memory bus, however, the RTX 2060 12 GB uses a narrower 192-bit wide bus, disabling 1/4th of the bus width of the "TU104." The memory data-rate on both SKUs is the same—14 Gbps. The segmentation between the two in the area of GPU clock speeds appears negligible. The original RTX 2060 ticks at 1680 MHz boost, while the new RTX 2060 12 GB does 1650 MHz boost. The typical board power is increased to 185 W compared to 160 W of the original RTX 2060, and 175 W of the RTX 2060 SUPER.

Update 15:32 UTC: NVIDIA has updated their website to remove the "Founders Edition" part from their specs page (3rd screenshot below). We confirmed with NVIDIA that there will be no RTX 2060 12 GB Founders Edition, only custom designs by their various board partners.

NVIDIA today released the GeForce 497.09 Game Ready drivers. These introduce launch-day optimization for "Icarus," including support for NVIDIA DLSS, and RTX ray-traced global illumination (RTX-GI). The drivers also add optimization for "Chorus," including DLSS support; and "Halo Infinite." Six new displays receive NVIDIA G-SYNC support. Among the fixes released with these drivers are TDR or system crashes with "DOOM Eternal" and RDR2, a display corruption with ye olde "DOOM 3 BFG Edition," extreme gamma/contrast issues with YouTube on hardware-accelerated web-browsers; NVIDIA Image Scaling resolutions not correctly appearing in-game after a driver update; and incompatibilities between Adaptive Sync and G-SYNC.

A curious addition with these drivers is support for the GeForce RTX 2060 12 GB graphics card. We've been hearing reports of NVIDIA resurrecting the RTX 2060 "Turing" with 12 GB of GDDR6 memory to target the 1080p gaming crowd; and these drivers confirm it. The 12 GB SKU could be achieved by pairing the "TU106" GPU with 12 GB of memory across its 192-bit wide memory interface.

DOWNLOAD: NVIDIA GeForce 497.09 WHQL

Well, that was a short one. Just last week we released GPU-Z 2.42.0, this week we have 2.43.0, which fixes a crash on older Radeon cards, including Radeon HD 5000. After last week's release people fired up these cards in masses, to see the change from AMD to ATI logo. This new activity helped uncovered a few problems, which are fixed with this update. We also fixed a screenshot feature bug that appeared since v2.39.0 on machines with Windows XP. GPU-Z adds the ability to read power limits of NVIDIA GeForce RTX 30-series Laptop GPUs ("Ampere"), which will help you to find out exactly which Ampere Mobile SKU you have, what its power limits are, and whether you could flash its VBIOS to increase the limits. You can find these values in the "NVIDIA BIOS" section of the "Advanced" tab. The ability to report power limits for Ampere Mobile has been added to our VGA BIOS Database, too. The execution unit (EU) count of Intel Xe LP iGPUs on "Rocket Lake" processors has been fixed. Support is added for NVIDIA Quadro RTX 3000 series based on the TU106-B silicon. Grab GPU-Z from the link below.

DOWNLOAD: TechPowerUp GPU-Z 2.43.0

The upcoming ASUS CMP 40HX mining card has been tested and appears to offer mining speeds of up to 43.77 MH/s which is significantly higher than the 36 MH/s advertised by NVIDIA. The ASUS CMP 40HX cards were working in a power-optimized cluster and likely had memory clock speeds adjusted to achieve the 21% increase in hash speeds. The NVIDIA CMP 40HX is based on the TU106-100 GPU and was expected to launch in the first quarter but this release has been delayed with board partners still testing. The ASUS CMP 40HX will reportedly launch for 699 USD while the ASUS CMP 30HX launch price will be reduced from 799 USD to 599 USD.

We have recently discovered that NVIDIA's newly announced 30HX and 40HX Crypto Mining Processors are based on the last-generation Turing architecture. This news will come as a pleasant surprise to gamers as the release shouldn't affect the availability of Ampere RTX 30 Series GPUs. The decision to stick with Turing for these new devices is reportedly due to the more favorable power-management of the architecture which is vital for profitable cryptocurrency mining operations. The NVIDIA CMP 40HX will feature a custom TU106 processor while the 30HX will include a custom TU116. This information was discovered in the latest GeForce 461.72 WHQL drivers which added support for the two devices.

PC enthusiast VIK-on pulled off a sophisticated memory mod for the GeForce RTX 2070, doubling its memory amount to 16 GB. In a detailed video presentation (linked below), VIK-on demonstrated how he carefully removed the 8 Gb Micron-made GDDR6 memory chips of his card, with 16 Gb Samsung-made chips he bought off AliExpress for $200. Memory replacement mods are extremely difficult to pull off, as you first de-solder the existing chips using a hot air gun while keeping the contacts on the PCB intact (ensuring no pins short); and solder the replacement BGA memory chips in place.

In addition, a set of "jumpers" on the PCB need to be modified to make it recognize the Samsung memory. The resulting card booted to desktop successfully, with GPU-Z reading its full 16 GB memory size. The card successfully made it through 3DMark TimeSpy, albeit with 30% lower performance than a normal RTX 2070 (6176 points vs. ~9107 points). The card would also crash Furmark. Still, it's mighty impressive that the "TU106" recognizes 16 GB of addressable memory (which means all its memory channels are intact), without the need for any BIOS mods, which is impossible to pull off.Watch the VIK-on video presentation here.

ZOTAC today introduced the White Edition variant of its compact GeForce RTX 2060 Super OC graphics card (model: ZT-T20610K-10M). The whitewash sees the card's metal 3D back-plate, cooler shroud, and fan impellers don white. while the underlying PCB sticks to black. The other exclusive feature with this card is its GPU Boost frequency of 1680 MHz, compared to 1650 MHz of the original (ZT-T20610E-10M). The board design is otherwise identical. Based on the 12 nm "TU106" silicon, the RTX 2060 Super features 2,176 CUDA cores, and 8 GB of GDDR6 memory across a 256-bit wide memory bus. The company didn't reveal pricing or availability.

NVIDIA board partners carving out GeForce RTX 20-series and GTX 16-series SKUs from ASICs they weren't originally based on, is becoming more common, but GALAX has taken things a step further. The company just launched a GeForce GTX 1650 (GDDR6) graphics card based on the "TU106" silicon (ASIC code: TU106-125-A1). The company carved a GTX 1650 out of this chip by disabling all of its RT cores, all its tensor cores, and a whopping 61% of its CUDA cores, along with proportionate reductions in TMU- and ROP counts. The memory bus width has been halved from 256-bit down to 128-bit.

The card, however, is only listed by the Chinese regional arm of GALAX. The card's marketing name is "GALAX GeForce GTX 1650 Ultra," with "Ultra" being a GALAX brand extension, and not an NVIDIA SKU (i.e. the GPU isn't called "GTX 1650 Ultra"). The GPU clock speeds for this card is identical to those of the original GTX 1650 that's based on TU117 - 1410 MHz base, 1590 MHz GPU Boost, and 12 Gbps (GDDR6-effective) memory.

ASUS unveiled the GeForce RTX 2060 DUAL Mini series, a new pair of RTX 2060 graphics cards purpose-built to compete with AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT, and possibly priced to match the EVGA RTX 2060 KO. The series consists of two otherwise identical looking cards differentiated with clock speeds - the reference speed "DUAL-RTX2060-6G-MINI," and the slightly overclocked "DUAL-RTX2060-O6G-MINI." The DUAL Mini common board design measures 19.7 cm in length, 12.1 cm height, and is strictly 2-slot thick. Under the hood is PCB that's built to cost, and probably repurposing the company's GTX 1660 Ti series PCBs, since the TU116 and TU106 are pin-compatible.

The cooling solution of the ASUS RTX 2060 DUAL Mini features an aluminium fin-stack heatsink that makes direct contact with the GPU at the base; ventilated by a pair of 90 mm Axial-Tech fans that are designed to guide all their airflow axially. The impellers of these fans feature IP5X dust-resistance coating. The card also offers idle fan-stop feature. As mentioned earlier, the base RTX 2060 DUAL Mini ticks at NVIDIA reference clock speeds, while the DUAL Mini O6G offers overclocked speeds of 1365 MHz base and 1725 MHz GPU Boost (vs. reference speeds of 1365/1680 MHz). The memory clock is untouched on both cards, at 14 Gbps (GDDR6 effective). The card draws power from a single 8-pin PCIe power connector. Display outputs include one each of dual-link DVI-D, HDMI 2.0b, and DisplayPort 1.4 connectors. The cards don't appear to feature a back-plate. We expect the DUAL Mini to be priced at USD $299, and the DUAL Mini O6G at a $20-30 premium.

AMD is developing a larger GPU based on its new "Navi" architecture to power a new high-end graphics card family, likely the Radeon RX 5800 series. The codename "Navi 12" is doing rounds on social media through familiar accounts that have high credibility with pre-launch news and rumors. The "Navi 10" silicon was designed to compete with NVIDIA's "TU106," as its "XT" and "Pro" variants outperform NVIDIA's original RTX 2060 and RTX 2070, forcing it to develop the RTX 20 Super series, by moving up specifications a notch.

Refreshing its $500 price-point was particularly costly for NVIDIA, as it was forced to tap into the 13.6 billion-transistor "TU104" silicon to carve out the RTX 2070 Super; while for the RTX 2060 Super, it had to spend 33 percent more on the memory chips. With the "Navi 12" silicon, AMD is probably looking to take a swing at NVIDIA's "TU104" silicon, which has been maxed out by the RTX 2080 Super, disrupting the company's $500-700 lineup once again, with its XT and Pro variants. There's also a remote possibility of "Navi 12" being an even bigger chip, targeting the "TU102."

During our disassembly of the GeForce RTX 2060 Super, we noticed a shocking detail. The 12 nm "TU106" GPU on which it is based, has the marking "Korea." We know for a fact that TSMC does not have any fabs there. The only Korean semiconductor manufacturer capable of contract-manufacturing a piece of silicon as complex as a GPU, for a designer with the energy-efficiency OCD as NVIDIA, is Samsung.

What makes this interesting is that Samsung does not officially have a 12 nm FinFET process. It has 14 nm, and the 11LPP, a 11 nm nodelet, which the company designed to compete with TSMC 12 nm. It would hence be really interesting to hear from NVIDIA on whether they've scaled out the "TU106" to 14LPP, or down to 11LPP at Samsung. It's interesting to note that the shrink in transistor sizes in these nodelets doesn't affect die-sizes. We hence see no die-size difference between these Korea-marked chips, and those marked "Taiwan." We've reached out to NVIDIA for comment.

Update July 3rd: NVIDIA got back to us

NVIDIAThe answer is really simple and these markings are not new. Other Turing GPUs have had these markings in the past. The chip is made at TSMC, but packaged in various locations. This one was done in Korea, hence why his says "Korea".

On an unrelated note: We already use both TSMC and Samsung, and qualify each of them for every process node. We can't comment in any further detail on future plans, but both remain terrific partners.

Ahead of formal launch tomorrow (2nd July), followed by a 9th July market availability, pictures of EVGA's custom-design GeForce RTX 2060 Super and RTX 2070 Super graphics cards were leaked to the web by an early listing on Amazon. The RTX 2060 Super XC Ultra is a triple-slot monstrosity, which uses a thicker heatsink ventilated by a pair of spinners; while the RTX 2070 Super XC is the base variant of an entire stack of cards based on this chip. The boxes have clear "Super" branding in the SKU detail corners. This branding is also found on metal decals on the cooler shrouds, and printed on the back-plates.

The listing also confirms that the RTX 2060 Super features 8 GB of GDDR6 memory. This move was necessitated by AMD equipping its Radeon RX 5700 graphics card with 8 GB of 14 Gbps GDDR6 memory. The RTX 2060 Super makes full use of the 256-bit memory bus width of the "TU106" silicon. The RTX 2070 Super, on the other hand, is based on the larger "TU104" chip, and has 2,560 of the 3,072 CUDA cores present on the chip enabled. This SKU is designed to compete with the RX 5700 XT. We'll find pictures of custom-design RTX 2080 Super as we inch closer to its July 23 market availability date.

Here are some of the first live pictures (not renders) of the upcoming GeForce RTX 2060 Super graphics card. As with the rest of the RTX 20 Super-series, this card features a reference board design resembling that of the original RTX 20-series, but with a chrome embellishment that accommodates the "Super" badge. The RTX 2060 Super is designed to compete with the upcoming Radeon RX 5700 at USD $399, or $50 more than the original RTX 2060. It's based on the "TU106" silicon, and is configured with 2,176 CUDA cores, but more importantly, a memory setup that's both 33 percent larger and faster than that of the original RTX 2060, made up of 8 GB of GDDR6 memory across a 256-bit wide bus, clocked at 14 Gbps. The card is expected to perform halfway between the RTX 2060 and RTX 2070.

NVIDIA's SUPER teaser hasn't crystallized into something physical as of now, but we know it's coming - NVIDIA themselves saw to it that our (singularly) collective minds would be buzzing about what that teaser meant, looking to steal some thunder from AMD's E3 showing. Now, that teaser seems to be coalescing into something amongst the industry: an entire lineup upgrade for Turing products, with NVIDIA pulling their chips up one rung of the performance chair across their entire lineup.

Apparently, NVIDIA will be looking to increase performance across the board, by shuffling their chips in a downward manner whilst keeping the current pricing structure. This means that NVIDIA's TU106 chip, which powered their RTX 2070 graphics card, will now be powering the RTX 2060 SUPER (with a reported core count of 2176 CUDA cores). The TU104 chip, which power the current RTX 2080, will in the meantime be powering the SUPER version of the RTX 2070 (a reported 2560 CUDA cores are expected to be onboard), and the TU102 chip which powered their top-of-the-line RTX 2080 Ti will be brought down to the RTX 2080 SUPER (specs place this at 8 GB GDDR6 VRAM and 3072 CUDA cores). This carves the way for an even more powerful SKU in the RTX 2080 Ti SUPER, which should be launched at a later date. Salty waters say the RTX 2080 Ti SUPER will feature and unlocked chip which could be allowed to convert up to 300 W into graphics horsepower, so that's something to keep an eye - and a power meter on - for sure. Less defined talks suggest that NVIDIA will be introducing an RTX 2070 Ti SUPER equivalent with a new chip as well.

Public perception on NVIDIA's new RTX series of graphics cards was sometimes marred by an impression of wrong resource allocation from NVIDIA. The argument went that NVIDIA had greatly increased chip area by adding RTX functionality (in both its Tensor ad RT cores) that could have been better used for increased performance gains in shader-based, non-raytracing workloads. While the merits of ray tracing oas it stands (in terms of uptake from developers) are certainly worthy of discussion, it seems that NVIDIA didn't dedicate that much more die area to their RTX functionality - at least not to the tone of public perception.

After analyzing full, high-res images of NVIDIA's TU106 and TU116 chips, reddit user @Qesa did some analysis on the TPC structure of NVIDIA's Turing chips, and arrived at the conclusion that the difference between NVIDIA's RTX-capable TU106 compared to their RTX-stripped TU116 amounts to a mere 1.95 mm² of additional logic per TPC - a 22% area increase. Of these, 1.25 mm² are reserved for the Tensor logic (which accelerates both DLSS and de-noising on ray-traced workloads), while only 0.7 mm² are being used for the RT cores.

EK Water Blocks, the Slovenia based water cooling gear manufacturer, is introducing its new generation water blocks for the popular ROG Strix GeForce RTX series graphics cards, based on Turing TU106, Turing TU104 and Turing TU102 graphics processor.

The inspiration for the new GPU block name "Vector" came from the sheer computing power of the graphics cards that are on the market today. Naming a water block "Full Cover" isn't enough these days, when the product is packed with unique features, such as these. The EK Vector Strix RTX water blocks are specially designed for multiple ROG Strix GeForce RTX Turing based graphics cards. The water block itself uses the signature EK single slot slim look, and it covers the entire PCB length. This sophisticated cooling solution will transform your powerful ROG graphics card into a minimalistic, elegant piece of hardware with accented RGB LED lighting. The block also features a unique aesthetic cover over the block Terminal which is designed to showcase the graphics card model via LEDs, visible from the side.

Here is the first picture of NVIDIA's 12 nm "TU116" silicon, which powers the upcoming GeForce GTX 1660 Ti graphics card. While the size of the package itself is identical to that of the "TU106" on which the RTX 2060 and RTX 2070 are based; the die of the TU116 is visibly smaller. This is because the chip physically lacks RT cores, and only has two-thirds the number of CUDA cores as the TU106, with 1,536 against the latter's 2,304. The die area, too, is about 2/3rds that of the TU106. The ASIC version of TU116 powering the GTX 1660 Ti is "TU116-400-A1."

VideoCardz scored not just pictures of the ASIC, but also the PCB of an MSI GTX 1660 Ti Ventus graphics card, which reveals something very interesting. The PCB has traces for eight memory chips, across a 256-bit wide memory bus, although only six of them are populated with memory chips, making up 6 GB over a 192-bit bus. The GPU's package substrate, too, is of the same size. It's likely that NVIDIA is using a common substrate, with an identical pin-map between the TU106 and TU116, so AIC partners could reduce PCB development costs.

GIGABYTE extended its all-white trim to its third graphics card from the RTX 20-series, the RTX 2070 Gaming OC White (model: GV-N2070GAMINGOC WHITE-8GC). This follows similar trims for the RTX 2060 Gaming OC Pro White and RTX 2070 Gaming OC Pro White. As with the others, the card's USP is its mostly-white cooler shroud with chrome inserts, and a matching white metal back-plate. Contrasting them are a trio of 90 mm matte-black fans with chrome hub stickers, and the black PCB carried over from the original Gaming OC series.

As with the RTX 2070 Gaming OC, this card offers a factory-overclock of 1725 MHz boost, compared to 1620 MHz reference. The memory is untouched at 14 Gbps (GDDR6-effective). The cooler offers 0 dBA mode (idle fan-stop). The card draws power from a combination of 8-pin and 6-pin PCIe power connectors. Display outputs include three DisplayPort 1.4, one HDMI 2.0b, and a USB-C VirtualLink. Based on the 12 nm "TU106" silicon, the GeForce RTX 2070 offers 2,304 CUDA cores, 288 tensor cores, 36 RT cores, 144 TMUs, 64 ROPs, and a 256-bit wide GDDR6 memory interface, holding 8 GB of memory. GIGABYTE is offering a unique 4-year warranty with this card, if you register your purchase with them.

Here are some of the first pictures of NVIDIA's upcoming GeForce RTX 2060 Founders Edition graphics card. You'll know from our older report that there could be as many as six variants of the RTX 2060 based on memory size and type. The Founders Edition is based on the top-spec one with 6 GB of GDDR6 memory. The card looks similar in design to the RTX 2070 Founders Edition, which is probably because NVIDIA is reusing the reference-design PCB and cooling solution, minus two of the eight memory chips. The card continues to pull power from a single 8-pin PCIe power connector.

According to VideoCardz, NVIDIA could launch the RTX 2060 on the 15th of January, 2019. It could get an earlier unveiling by CEO Jen-Hsun Huang at NVIDIA's CES 2019 event, slated for January 7th. The top-spec RTX 2060 trim is based on the TU106-300 ASIC, configured with 1,920 CUDA cores, 120 TMUs, 48 ROPs, 240 tensor cores, and 30 RT cores. With an estimated FP32 compute performance of 6.5 TFLOP/s, the card is expected to perform on par with the GTX 1070 Ti from the previous generation in workloads that lack DXR. VideoCardz also posted performance numbers obtained from NVIDIA's Reviewer's Guide, that point to the same possibility.

NVIDIA could launch its "RTX for the masses" SKU, the GeForce RTX 2060, sometime mid-January, according to Andreas Schilling. It is also confirmed that the RTX 2060 will feature 6 GB of GDDR6 memory. Schilling confirmed no other specifications of the GPU, but posted official branding for the RTX 2060 SKU. Earlier leaks pin the RTX 2060 as being carved out from the 12 nm "TU106" silicon, with 1,920 CUDA cores, 120 TMUs, 48 ROPs, and a 192-bit wide GDDR6 memory interface, which at 14 Gbps produces a memory bandwidth of 336 GB/s. NVIDIA could target the crowd that wants DXR-enabled gaming at 1080p thru 1440p resolutions.

With NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 20-series having already released for desktops, it was only a matter of time until laptops got the RTX treatment as well. Current rumors are suggesting that Nvidia will officially launch their GeForce RTX 20-series mobility GPUs on January 6th at CES with the RTX 2070 and RTX 2070 Max-Q taking center stage. An embargo date of January 26th has also been set, with NVIDIA delaying their final release drivers until then. Meaning final performance results for the new mobile GPUs won't be available until after the embargo date, which should coincide with the general availability of RTX 20-series equipped laptops.

Along with the RTX 2070 and 2070 Max-Q mobility parts, the flagship RTX 2080 Max-Q which isn't expected at the show, is still in the works, with its TU104M 1eab device ID having been leaked earlier. The rest of the GeForce 20-series mobility GPUs are likely to use the GTX moniker if NVIDIA's desktop lineup is anything to go by; however, that is merely speculation at this point.

Palit Microsystems Ltd, the leading graphics card manufacturer, releases the new NVIDIA Turing architecture GeForce RTX series in Palit GeForce product line-up, GeForce RTX 2070 Dual. NVIDIA GeForce RTX delivers the ultimate PC gaming experience. Powered by the new NVIDIA Turing GPU architecture and the revolutionary RTX platform, RTX graphics cards bring together real-time ray tracing, artificial intelligence, and programmable shading. This is a whole new way to experience games.

GeForce RTX 2070 is based on the NVIDIA Turing architecture TU106 GPU armed with 2304 CUDA cores and equipped with 8GB of GDDR6 memory running at an effective clock rate of 14 GHz on a 256-bit bus. Palit GeForce RTX 2070 is designed to deliver 6x more performance than previous-generation video card and brings the power of real-time ray tracing and AI to games. The Palit GeForce RTX 2070 Dual is targeting at MSRP $499 which is available in the market now.

Update: Gigabyte themselves have come out of the gates dismissing this as a typo on their part, which is disappointing, if not unexpected, considering that there is no real reason for NVIDIA to launch a new SKU to a market virtually absent of competition. Increased tiers of graphics card just give more options for the consumer, and why give an option that might drive customers away from more expensive graphics card options?

NVIDIA designed the $500 GeForce RTX 2070 based on its third largest silicon based on "Turing," the TU106. Reviews posted late Tuesday summarize the RTX 2070 to offer roughly the the same performance level as the GTX 1080 from the previous generation, at the same price. Generation-to-generation, the RTX 2070 offers roughly 30% more performance than the GTX 1070, but at 30% higher price, in stark contrast to the GTX 1070 offering 65% more performance than the GTX 970, at just 25% more price. NVIDIA's RTX varnish is still nowhere in sight. That said, NVIDIA is not on solid-ground with the RTX 2070, and there's a vast price gap between the RTX 2070 and the $800 RTX 2080. GIGABYTE all but confirmed the existence of an SKU in between.